ISLAMABAD: The Senate on Monday granted leave to move a private members bill seeking formation of a commission to probe Panama leaks with 32 members voting in its favour and 19 against it. The bill was moved by Opposition Leader Chaudhry Aitzaz Ahsan. Aitzaz said the existing laws in the country lacked scope to probe the Panama leaks. He said the revelations were not brought out by the opposition rather an independent investigative journalists’ body had published those leaks. He said the particular piece of the legislation had been drafted cautiously to remove the impression altogether that it was politically-motivated or a person-specific. However, Minister for Law and Justice Zahid Hamid Khan said it was a latently discriminatory law with an effort to rope in Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif whose name was not even mentioned in the Panama leaks. “It is one person-specific bill with a limited scope excluding Imran Khan, Jehangir Tareen, Aleem Khan and those who had received kickbacks and got written off bank loans,” he said. The bill, he added, would not help prevent illegal practices in future as it did not talk about the Bahamas leaks. He said the government had already introduced a bill in the National Assembly following the Supreme Court’s directives that current laws on commission of enquiry were toothless. He said the government had always made sincere efforts to probe not only the Panama Papers leaks but all corrupt practices of the past and that might take place in future. As part of such efforts, the minister said, motions were introduced in both the houses seeking formation of a parliamentary committee comprising members of the opposition and treasury benches. Following which, he added, the parliamentary committee was constituted, which had eight meetings but no consensus was evolved. “Thus, there was no need to let the bill be introduced as it did not sincerely fulfil the purpose to stop ill-practices,” he added. However, the chairman referred the bill to the standing committee concerned as 32 members voted in its favour. Meanwhile, the Upper House on Monday adopted a resolution condemning anti-Pakistan remarks by Muttahida Qaumi Movement (MQM)-London leader Altaf Hussain and urged the government to take strict action against him.